Category: #NormalContact administration

Category for pages and posts that have to do specifically with how the #NormalContact site and social media are run.

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#NormalContact administration Living a Normal Contactor life

Social media avatars from the community!

We had a normal contactor send us a cool thing that we had to share. This is a collection of social media avatars (or profile pics) that you can use on social media. Check them out above! (You can right-click to save them.) The pics are all 150 x 150 pixels, which works just about anywhere. (We have to admit: the ribbon image we use on the site is a little wonky. It still tickled us to see it turned into a clever, shareable form, though.)

We love seeing the community come up with great ideas! #NormalContact is not the volunteers that run the site and social media. Rather, #NormalContact is an idea we all agree on. To be honest, this site mostly only exists to make sure that no one can co-opt the name and corrupt the meaning. So it’s a huge honor and pleasure to be able to share some of the cool things people come up with that follow the #NormalContact philosophy. Social media avatars like this are a great way to share in low-key way.

Here’s a fun, but weird secret: #NormalContact is growing. So far, however, it seems to mostly be growing offline. We’ve seen our visitors in cities across the US slowly pop up in clusters. (That’s excluding any bots and spiders, of course.) That leads us to believe that #NormalContact is mostly spreading by word of mouth so far, rather than social media. That’s pretty cool! It means that this humble idea about relationships and interaction is spreading through relationships and interaction.

We keep our eyes out for things the community might post in addition to things people send us directly. #NormalContact is still in the early stages, but is coming into its own. Make sure to keep sharing with people, wear your ribbon, and use the #NormalContact hashtag, especially on Twitter and Instagram.

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#NormalContact administration

Why do we have so many short blog posts?

Why do we squeeze #NormalContact into such short blog posts?

Lately we’ve received a handful of messages asking us why we squeeze #NormalContact thoughts into such short blog posts. The answer is relatively simple: it helps us keep the blog posts super focused and within the scope of #NormalContact.

To be fair, we have our share of longer posts. Most of them, however, fall very close to the SEO-recommended minimum length of 300 words. That’s the length that search engines want to see to consider a page or post a “real” page, and not just a fragment. Even though we’re likely to be suppressed by a search engine like Google anyhow, we do put a bit of effort into making sure that our posts and pages are well-optimized.

Like we said, though, the biggest reason that we post so many short blog posts is mostly about staying focused. The #NormalContact philosophy has an extremely narrow focus. Some of our volunteers would love to write about the prudence of the shutdowns and masking. Others would like to write about the tyranny of those same things. Those personal opinions are fine to debate in our team chat. (We have a lively debate channel!) But on the blog they need to stay precisely that: personal opinions.

The bottom line is this: the worst thing that we could do is not actually to be wrong. The worst thing we could do would be to betray our own purpose with #NormalContact. This movement is about a small but powerful idea that goes beyond politics: the idea that our humanity comes first before fear. Or, as the authors of the Declaration of Independence put it: “We mutually pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred Honor.” And so for that reason, if nothing else, our blog posts often run a bit short. We hope you can forgive our choice of focus over quantity.

Categories
#NormalContact administration Living a Normal Contactor life

Is #NormalContact relevant?

Is #NormalContact relevant if the news cycle shifts? We say it is if we are still wearing masks or social distancing.
Is #NormalContact relevant if the news cycle shifts? We say it is if we are still wearing masks or social distancing.

A friend asked, “Is #NormalContact relevant if the news cycle shifted to police brutality and racism (or anything else) from COVID-19?” The answer is simple: #NormalContact is relevant as long as we have to remind ourselves that normal contact is normal!

It seems strange to have to remind ourselves as a society that it is ok to speak from within an arm’s reach. As Americans we stand much farther on average than most cultures when having a conversation. And yet, the distances we’re being told to interact with can seem practically astronomical by comparison. That’s not normal. Universally, we’re becoming used to not understanding each other as well through masks. That’s not normal, either. We’re learning to apologize when we brush someone not because we were rude, but because they might be deeply offended and fear for their lives. Is that really what we think should be acceptable as normal?

#NormalContact as a movement stands for one and only one thing: that we feel, based on the science, that it is ok if someone wants to have a normal interaction with us at normal distances. We aren’t going to force that on anyone, but until the general assumption is, once again, that a normal interaction is, well, normal, then there’s definitely no question regarding whether #NormalContact is relevant. If human interaction is relevant, then so is #NormalContact.

Is that all that makes #NormalContact relevant?

To be fair, #NormalContact isn’t relevant to everyone, although we would argue that it is relevant for everyone. We’ve met folks who don’t think #NormalContact is militant enough, or not in-your-face enough. While plenty of normal contactors are fervent advocates of reopening completely without delay, some aren’t. Some are strong anti-maskers, but others aren’t. For people who want #NormalContact to be more, we understand. And yet, it’s precisely because #NormalContact doesn’t stand for more that makes it so universal, and thus for everyone, even the folks who find it irrelevant to them because it doesn’t push any agenda hard enough for their tastes. Human interaction is for all of us, and that’s exactly what makes #NormalContact relevant.

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#NormalContact administration

Why isn’t there an official #NormalContact Facebook page?

There is no official #NormalContact Facebook page or group.
There is no official #NormalContact Facebook page or group.

We have Instagram and Twitter pages. Why don’t we have an official #NormalContact Facebook or YouTube page? In a word: privacy.

The #NormalContact site and social media are maintained by volunteers. These volunteers are given significant privacy because anyone and anything that goes against the general narrative these days tends to garner a lot of hate. (That’s why we don’t accept comments on the site, incidentally.) So our volunteers are sheltered from that hate by anonymized accounts and VPN access.

This worked fine for Instagram and Twitter. YouTube was quickly dismissed because Google tracks all the IDs on your device, which would have instantly tied them to the #NormalContact account. Facebook, however, was a pile of problems unique to itself.

Facebook doesn’t have an option for organizational accounts. All company pages have to be tied to an actual person. And Facebook has definitely done what they needed to make it difficult to fake. They disabled the account after they had an email and phone number. To fix it they wanted a picture of a face. (They got one, and it was even a volunteer pic.) …but then they disabled the account again. Now they also wanted an ID or bank statements. While we could totally fake those, it’s clear that FB is going to look for any excuse they can to disable the account. So we’ll pass.

That’s it? No official #NormalContact Facebook page?

Yup! …but that doesn’t mean there can’t be unofficial #NormalContact Facebook pages.

We invite anyone to make an unofficial #NormalContact Facebook page that chooses to do so. If you do set up a #NormalContact Facebook page please follow these guidelines.

  • Please make it clear that your page or group is unofficial and point to this site as the official source. Don’t claim any affiliation or support from this official site.
  • Be careful to follow the #NormalContact philosophy and keep the focus of your page extremely focused. Try to avoid promoting any specific ideas regarding reopening, etc.
  • Feel free to let us know about your page by sending us a link on one of the other platforms. While we can’t promise that we can promote it, we’d love to know about your efforts!
  • We strongly recommend that different #NormalContact Facebook pages look for opportunities to cross-promote whenever possible. Work to develop a robust and networked community of people.

It’s a shame that Facebook seems opposed to letting us create an official resource while maintaining anonymity, but that doesn’t stop us from actually building community. Remember to wear your ribbon and use the #NormalContact hashtag.

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#NormalContact administration

Share a ribbon with a friend!

You can use our template to give a #NormalContact ribbon to a friend or stranger more easily.
You can use our template to give a #NormalContact ribbon to a friend or stranger more easily.

We finally have a printable sheet (US Letter 8.5 x 11 only, so far) that you can use to share extra ribbons with friends and strangers. It has a quick explanation and then a link to the site. So if you end up with some extra ribbons laying around, spread the news!